Little Daisy
by Gemma Leigh S
Summary: What happened when instead of emerging through terrigenesis unscathed, Skye was de-aged into a tiny little girl.
1. Day One

"Skye! Skye!" Coulson raced into the temple. He'd just put one of the body covering things on, because he was not about to take any more risks than necessary. "No! Trip!" He recognized the face even though it was now stone but the man was falling apart. "Skye! Skye!" He couldn't even bear to think about what would happen if the same thing had happened to Skye.

"Who's Skye?" Coulson turned around and saw a little girl who looked four years old, sitting in a pile of rocks. "Where am I?"

Coulson forced himself to stop thinking about Skye and turned to the little girl. "We're underground, but I can get you out. Can you tell me your name?" He'd contemplate how a child got there later.

"My name's Mary."

"What's your last name Mary? Maybe I can use it to help you find your family."

"I don't have any family, but my name's Mary Sue Poots, and I live at St. Agnes Orphanage."

Coulson tried as hard as he could not to faint in shock. It was possible there was another explanation; maybe they gave the same horrible name to all the girls who came through their doors. Deep down, he knew that that wasn't the case. Now that he thought about it, the girl did look a little familiar and he could see the resemblance to Skye.

"Are you taking me back there?" she asked, in a very neutral tone.

"No. You're never going to have to go back there. I promise."

"Really? 'Cause I don't like it there. All the nuns are mean, and they don't like kids, but they also told me that being there is the only way I would get to have a family."

"I will find you the best family ever, and you won't have to go back there. How does that sound?"

On the inside, Mary wanted to scream and dance. "That would be really good. Thank you, sir."

"It's no problem, Mary, and you can call me Coulson, not sir. Is there anything you want me to call you?" He remembered how much Skye hated that name, but he wasn't sure if she hated it at age four or however old she was.

"Call me Mary. I don't really like it 'cause other kids make fun of me, but I don't have any other names."

"Why don't I give you one? What do you think of Daisy?" He didn't want to add to her current confusion by suggesting Skye.

"Okay. I like daisies."

"That's good. Why don't you come with me then, Daisy?"

He had a lot of explaining to do when he got back to the bus.

* * *

"Coulson. What happened? Where's Trip? Where's Skye? Who's the girl?" Coulson was relieved to see that Mack was there and back to normal.

"Everyone, quiet. I'll be back in a minute." By some miracle, everyone shut up. "Daisy, look at me." The little girl who had started shaking slowly looked up at him. "I'm going to take you to my friend Skye's room. You're going to wait there for a bit and then I'll come and get you. If you need anything, you can yell and I'll come get you." He wasn't worried about her doing it for no reason. The poor thing seemed terrified of him. He walked up with her to Skye's room, found Skye's phone and downloaded a game that seemed like it would be suitable for kids. He walked down the stairs.

"First, I'm afraid Agent Triplett did not make it out of the temple. Despite not touching the obelisk, he was showing the same reaction as those that had. We will have a proper time for mourning, but right now we have another issue on our hands. I think the obelisk did something to Skye."

"What do you mean? Is she dead? Where is she?" A million questions came flying at him at once.

"Hold your questions for a minute. Also, I believe you just saw her. Instead of dying, I'm under the impression she was de-aged. I have no idea why, but hopefully Fitz-Simmons will be to sort that out and return adult Skye back to us. I will talk with Skye's father and see if he knows anything about why this happened. For those of you that are interested, Raina was nowhere to be found. For now, Skye is being called Daisy as I don't want to confuse her by calling her the name of a missing friend. Now, any questions?"

No one said a word. Finally May spoke up. "What are we going to do with her?"

"That has yet to be decided."

"Sir, I hate to bring it up, especially since Skye is now so young, but being exposed to the diviner could have had even more repercussions. I can't see any way around her being quarantined."

"Simmons, is there really no other option? We can't just leave a scared, young girl in an empty room for months.

"The only alternative would be sending someone else in there so that she'd have company, but that could potentially be extremely dangerous for that person. The same thing might happen to them as what happened to Trip."

"Very well. I'll do it."

"Sir, you can't. You're the director. S.H.I.E.L.D. won't function without you."

"Well, who else? Fitz-Simmons will need to be running tests so it can't be one of them, and I don't-"

"I'll do it." interrupted May.

"May, you can't. We need you."

"Coulson, you know perfectly well I'm the best option. You were just about to say how unfair it would be to ask this of Bobbi, Hunter, or Mack. Plus, they're just as useful as I am. Any one of us is going to be a loss, but it should be me."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure."

"Okay, Simmons how soon will the quarantine have to start?"

"As soon as possible, sir. You're very lucky you kept the suit on, or you would've had to go in, too. May, are you aware of the possible dangers?"

"Yes, I am. Stop bothering me. Daisy can't be there alone, and I'm the person most suited to be with her. That's it. Simmons, is there anyplace that would have a better quarantine location? There's no need for either of us to stay on the bus, and I'm sure there are better options than what we have on the plane."

"Of course. The Playground actually has a very nice one. We can keep our course."

"Excellent." She went upstairs to grab any stuff she might want from her room, and packed it. It was going to be a long three months, but it was the least she could do.

* * *

Finally, they arrived.

"May, could you call into Koenig and tell him the plan before we open the door."

"Already done. He says for you all to go in first, and he told me directions to get to the quarantine room. I'm going to go grab Daisy." They all filed out except for Coulson.

He grabbed her arm. "May, are you sure you want to do this? You don't have to."

"Yes, I do."

"Well, I'm going to miss you."

"You too." she muttered gruffly.

He left out the door of the bus. He needed to contact Skye's father.

* * *

"Daisy? Are you in there?"

"Yes. I'm here."

May heard words from a long time ago play in her head: _She's gonna be scared. Take a knee. Get down to her level. _She didn't want to think of the fact that Daisy and Katya even looked slightly similar. She opened the door and walked over to where the little girl was curled in a ball. She took a knee.

"Daisy? You can call me May. You're gonna be living with me for a while. Is there anything you want to bring?"

"Can I bring the phone, ma'am?"

"Of course, and you don't need to call me ma'am. May is fine."

"Okay, ma-May. Is this Skye?" Daisy held up a picture of the future her.

"Yes, it is."

"She looks nice."

"She's very nice. Do you want to bring the photo with you?"

"Can I?"

"Sure. Is that all you want to bring?"

"Yea-I mean, yes." May would deal with the girl's obvious worry of being anything less than perfect later.

"Okay. Let's go then. We're getting our own mini-house."

"Really?!" Daisy sounded slightly excited, which May knew meant she was ecstatic on the inside. She was worried about how expressionless the little girl was. It reminded her too much of herself, and she knew what it had taken for her to get to that point. Skye wasn't like that at all, so what had her life been like at this age?

"Yes. Follow me."

The girl diligently followed her, carrying the phone in one hand and the picture of the adult Skye in the other. May opened the door labeled 'QUARANTINE' and took Daisy to her room first. "We're going to be living her for three months, so get used to the room." A conflicted look flashed behind the girls eyes, quickly pushed away. "I'm going to go put my stuff in my room. You can do whatever you want."

May hadn't been around children for far too long. She briefly considered whether it had been a mistake to volunteer for being alone with the girl for three months, but she knew it was the only option. She resisted the urge to call the one person who knew about everything and would understand everything. She prayed the kitchen would have something that all she needed to do was warm up because she didn't want Daisy to die of food poisoning. She found frozen pizza, warmed it up and called Daisy to the kitchen.

"Are you okay with pizza?"

"Yes, ma-May."

Dinner was eaten in silence, and May took note of how quickly Daisy devoured her food. At this rate, she was going to need to make the call just for Daisy's sake.

"I'm afraid we don't have dessert, so you'll have to make do without. Do you know if there were any pyjamas in your drawers?"

"I don't think so."

"Very well. You can wear one of my shirts as a nightie."

Daisy suddenly looked very scared. "No! You don't have to. I don't want to be a nuisance. I don't need anything." May wanted to torture, then kill, whoever had made the poor girl feel like this. She got down on one knee and looked the girl in the eyes.

"Daisy. I might not have to give you clothes, but I want to. You are not a nuisance. You never have been, and you never will be. You do need things, and that's normal. It is not a bad thing, and it is definitely not your fault." Daisy started to walk towards her, and then stopped herself. May saw how desperately the young girl wanted to believe her and wanted some sort of physical affection. She sat down and pulled the young girl into her lap and stroked Daisy's hair as Daisy held on to her with all her might, quivering with restrained tears.


	2. Night One

May awoke to sounds coming from Daisy's room. She ran in to see the little girl tossing and turning with tears streaming down her cheeks. Daisy was still asleep, but she was talking.

"I'm sorry I called you mommy. I didn't mean it. It won't happen again. I promise. Don't send me away. No! Don't! I'm sorry!" May gently tapped her on the shoulder. She woke up suddenly, threw herself off the bed and crawled under the bed, sobbing. That was when May noticed that most things in the room were shaking and moving. As if she needed something else to compare Daisy and Katya with, apparently they both had powers. She ran back to her room with Daisy still under the bed. Once she was there, she checked her watch. It was just past midnight where he lived. She restrained for a minute, and then couldn't stop herself from picking up the phone. He answered immediately.

"Melinda? What's wrong? What's happening? Are you okay?"

"Oh, Drew." She couldn't stop herself from crying.

"Melinda, please. I can't help you if I don't know what's wrong."

With her breathing still shaky, she told him everything, from offering to join Daisy in quarantine and who she was, until leaving her hiding under her bed because the similarities to Katya had become too much to bear.

"Melinda. You need to get back there. You did the only thing you could with Katya, but now you have options. Comfort her. I'm sure she's as scared as you are. This is your chance to prove to yourself that you can help someone in her position. You couldn't help Katya, but you can help Daisy. Call me in the morning and we'll figure out a better plan. Bring her to your bed tonight. She's going to need someone."

"Thank you, I'm sorry for calling."

"Don't be. Never be."

She went back into the room.

"Daisy. Come out from underneath the bed, please." The girl was still sobbing.

"I'm not mad. Come to me, please."

Daisy's words were now distinguishable. "Please don't hurt me. Please don't send me away. Please. I'm sorry." She kept saying it on repeat, and May felt mad at S.H.I.E.L.D. for one of the first times ever. Daisy probably never got sent to the good homes because they would be wasted on someone who would have to leave in a few weeks.

"Daisy. I won't hurt you, and I won't send you away. Come to me, please. I'm sorry I left." her voice was still shaking from all the crying. "Please, Daisy. Please. I'm sorry." The girl slowly crawled out from underneath the bed. She curled up in a ball in the corner with her arms wrapped around herself. She was still sobbing. May crawled over to her and stopped when she got a few feet away. Everything in the room was still shaking which definitely wasn't helping the situation. May sat cross-legged with her arms open. "Breathe, Daisy. Come to me. Breathe." May kept repeating it over and over, and eventualy the sobbing turned to shaky breathing, and Daisy moved little by little towards her. When she was within arms reach, May scooped her up and held her in her lap. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. It won't happen again. Don't send me away. Don't hurt me." With each word, May had to tighten her grip on her inner self. She wanted to scream in anger at whoever had done this to the poor girl, but she knew that wouldn't help her right now. For now, she just held her as they both sobbed.

Ten minutes later, Daisy had stopped crying, but May hadn't. She had seven years of pent-up emotions that she was finally letting go, because she would not, could not, fail Daisy the way she had failed Katya. She was helping Daisy, and she would never stop. While Daisy had stopped crying, she was still apologizing. "I'm sorry. I made you scared and sad. I'm sorry I'm a bad person. I'm sorry for everything I do. I'm sorry for being me." That last sentence shocked May out of her misery. She tried as hard as she possible to keep a tight rein on her anger, but it was not easy.

"Daisy. Never say that again. Promise me you will never say that again. It is not your fault that I was scared or sad. You helped me feel better. You are a not a bad person, and you will never be a bad person. You haven't done anything wrong so don't apologize for nothing, and never, ever apologize for being you. You are perfect, and nothing will ever change that."

Daisy looked up with her with hope plain in her eyes. It was the first time that her expression had been obvious and easy to read. "Really?"

"Really."

"Th-then why are you sending me away in three months. I know it's longer than everyone else, but even they say at the beginning that I'll be with them forever. I thought since you didn't say that that I'd be here for even shorter, or that you were forced to keep me for three months."

"No. I'm sorry I let you think that. I chose to be here with you for three months, and after that we're moving, but you can stay with me if you want to. You can always stay with me. No matter what. I promise." May knew what a big promise she was making, but she knew that there was no way she was going to go back on it.

"Daisy, how old are you?"

"No one knows, 'cause no one knows my birthday, but they think I'm five."

May thought of how if she and Andrew had had kids when they were trying to, their child would be a similar age right now.

"I'll find out what your birthday is, sweetie."

"Really? I can have a birthday like everyone else?"

"Really. Did you never celebrate a birthday before?"

"Nuh-uh, birthdays are for good girls, and I'm too bad to have a birthday. Even if I was good, a sister said that my birthday would be a fake birthday 'cause no one knows when it is."

"Even if I can't find your real birthday, you can choose another one, and we can make it real, and you can have a lot of birthday parties to make up for the ones they forgot about at St. Agnes. Does that sound good?"

"Yes! Thank you, May."

"Good. Now, do you want to come to my bed for the night?"

Brown eyes looked up at her that screamed yes. "No, thank you." Daisy shook her head.

"Well, I want you to. Is that okay?"

"Yeah."

Daisy's eyes watered, and she started to lift her arms so she could be carried before quickly throwing them back down. May picked her up anyway. She would make sure that for as long as Skye was a child, she would be looked after, and if Daisy stayed as Daisy forever, then May would look after her forever.


	3. Day Two

May woke up the next morning to find that Daisy wasn't there. She was surprised that she'd managed to get out of bed without waking her, but she figured that after last night it was unsurprising that she'd been in a deep sleep. She checked in her room first; she wasn't there. Slightly worried, she checked the kitchen. Daisy wasn't there either. After going into the living room, she started yelling.

"Daisy! Daisy! Please come here." In the middle of calling out for Daisy, her phone rang.

"Melinda? You never called, and it's 10am."

"I slept in after last night, but Daisy's gone." she said exasperatedly, trying to hide the underlying worry in her tone.

"What do you mean, gone?"

"I can't find her anywhere. I've called for her, but I don't think she's in the house."

"She's probably embarrassed about what happened last night, and wanted to run away before you sent her away. That way there's less room for hurt and while she might hate herself for doing it, she won't feel abandoned again."

"I would never send her away!"

"I know that, but she doesn't. Don't worry. She can't have gotten far. She probably slept in too. She might decide to stay close if she doesn't know where she is. Is there any sheds on the property?"

"Yeah, chalk-full of weapons."

"Get to her quickly. Who knows what she might try and do, and they might scare her way more if she's seen them before."

May ended the call and ran outside, stopping just before the shed, and walked in slowly. Daisy was looking at the guns, and was shaking uncontrollably, along with everything in the shed. Her gaze was completely blank. May sat next to her.

"Daisy? Daisy, look at me, please." Another time, she might've been disappointed in herself for sounding so desperate. Still, there was no response. She scooped up the young girl and princess-carried her to her room where she nestled her under the covers. Within minutes, she was asleep. May put on some peaceful music and sat there for the next hour, watching over her as she slept. She woke up suddenly, either from habit or from a bad dream, May wasn't sure, but within seconds, she was hiding underneath the covers. "Daisy. It's okay. You can come out. I'm not mad." The little girl wouldn't come out and May didn't want to drag her out. "Oh, you want some alone time? That's okay. I'm going to get the sandwiches out of the fridge. Come down when you're ready." May got the sandwiches out in one minute, and it took another eight for Daisy to walk down. Thank goodness for children's non-existent ability to tolerate boredom. Plus, if she was beating herself up, which May thought she was, it was unlikely to last long. The Skye she knew never dwelled on blame for too long. She decided to wait for Daisy to speak. That didn't occur until long after she'd finished her sandwich.

"I'm sorry for everything. I know I was bad, but you seem nice so maybe you could let me stay for a little longer?"

"What do you think you did that was bad?"

"Last night, I woke you up, I cried, I slept in your bed, I had a nightmare, I ran away, I got scared, I hid from you and your punishment, I didn't talk, and I'm sure there's other stuff 'cause there's always more."

"Who told you all that stuff was bad?"

"The nuns, the people in the group homes, and my foster parents."

"We have different rules in this house, kid. Waking me up isn't bad, crying isn't bad, sleeping in my bad is okay sometimes, having nightmares isn't bad, and getting scared isn't bad. You shouldn't run away, but you're not in trouble. It's easier for us if you talk because then I can help you if something's wrong, but if sometimes you don't want to talk, that's okay too." May had many more people on her enemies list, but she was prouder of Skye than she had ever been before. Coulson had talked about how resilient she was, but she'd never really understood. For Skye to have a childhood that from where Daisy was now, probably only got worse, and to come out kind and optimistic… May wouldn't have thought that was possible.

"Are you sure? I've never heard that before."

"I'm very sure, and if you ever forget that, just come and ask me and I can always remind you. In this house, it's a lot easier to be good."

Daisy smiled, and it lit up the whole room.

"Now, I'm afraid we aren't allowed to leave the house. So, I was thinking it would be a good idea for us to plan what we're going to do for the next little bit. Does that sound good?"

"Yeah." May didn't think she'd ever been so happy to not hear the word yes.

"Tomorrow, I'm going to start teaching you some schoolwork. I don't know what you've learned though so you're going to have to help me. We're going to be learning languages, English, math, computer science, and a little bit of normal science and history. Does that sound good?"

"I don't like schoo-sorry. I know I'm not supposed to be ungrayful. That sounds good."

"No need to hide what you're feeling. Why don't you like school?"

"All the kids make fun of me because they say my clothes don't fit and my eyes look weird."

"Well, mine are the same. Do you think they would make fun of me?"

"No…"

"That means they were just looking for a reason to be mean. Also, you don't need to worry about other kids. It's just going to be you and me for a while."

"Okay, that makes it better."

"When we're not doing school, you can either play or I can teach you how to fight." May knew that since Daisy was close to both her and Coulson, she'd be wanted for that, and she also knew that if anyone found out about her powers they might try and take her for those, not to mention her crazy father. Basically, she needed to learn how to fight.

"I didn't know you could learn to fight. I thought you just did it."

May forced down her inner happiness that they were actually having a conversation where Daisy didn't seem to be overthinking her every word, and replied to her observation.

"You can learn to fight, but we'll also be learning gymnastics." May had looked around the quarantine and talked to Koenig, and had discovered that it may as well have been a resort. Apparently, the Playground was called the Playground for a reason. It had an area that was designed for any families that were in danger that couldn't be known by anyone. It worked perfectly for them. It had a gymnastics room, a regular gymnasium, a gym for working out, a room for fighting, a grass field, an ice rink, a swimming pool, and an enormous playground.

"Why don't I show you around, and then you can show me what you want to do before dinner." After the tour, Daisy was still curious about the ice.

"Why would people want to walk on ice?"

"Here, why don't I show you before dinner?"

"Really?"

"Yeah."

She found a jacket in both of their closets, and found skates that fit both of them. They got on the ice and Daisy nearly fell but May managed to catch her.

"Here. Hold my hands and don't move your feet. Just stand. I'll move us."

They did a few laps and Daisy was giggling the whole way.

"Was that fun?"

"Yeah!"

"Well, I'm afraid it's time for dinner. We can skate again another time, though."

"That was skating?!"

"Yeah."

"People at school used to talk about skating, but I didn't think I'd ever get to do it."

"You'll get to do it a lot, but now it's time for dinner."

The whole meal Daisy was chattering away, and while May might not have looked it, it was the happiest she'd been in a very long time.

"Daisy. I need to call Coulson. Do you remember him?"

"Was he the person that took me to Skye's room?"

"Yeah. Do you want to go to your room, or do you want to talk to him with me."

"If we talk to him, can I be close to you?"

"Of course. Well done, Daisy. I'm sure you're proud of yourself for being so brave. I know your time with him was scary."

* * *

"Coulson."

"May. How's Sk-Daisy?"

"She's good. We've had a few mishaps, but those can be discussed later. How have you progressed with finding Cal?"

"We're trying. He seems to have fallen off the globe."

"Okay. Update me when you know more. Daisy, would like to say hi to Coulson?"

"Okay. Hi Coulson."

"Hi Daisy. How are you?"

"I got to go skating! How are you?"

"I'm okay. Thank you for asking. I'm sorry to ask this, and if it isn't okay, let me know, but could you please go to your room so that May and I could talk about some private stuff?"

"Sure."

"I'll come soon." called out May as Daisy was leaving the room.

"Mishaps?"

"She seems to have the power to make things shake. I'm assuming she got it from the obelisk, and it's triggered to her emotions. I'll teach her tai chi and meditation. Hopefully, that will be enough for now, but the hunt for Cal just got more important. This mess was his idea and I bet he knows how to help her, but Coulson, don't let him know she's a kid. We don't need him getting any ideas about kidnapping her, telling her he's her father, and raising her as if everything in his insane world is perfect."

"Agreed. I'll get more people on the search. How is she otherwise?"

"Not great. I never realized just how bad Skye's childhood was, but being moved from place to place means that no one wanted her. She was placed in some awful homes, and she expects to be punished for existing."

"I'm sorry to hear that. It looks like you'll have your work cut out for you. Are you starting training?"

"Yeah. Right now, it's basic school, gymnastics, fighting, and free time. If she wants to learn an instrument, I'll get her a violin and I'll teach her that and piano."

"How long has it been since you last played?"

"Seven years, but I'll remember."

"Okay. Sounds good. Keep me updated."

"You too. Bye."

"Bye."


	4. Day Three

Since Daisy was sleeping through the night, for the first time in who know how long, May decided to let her sleep in and not wake her for tai chi. That meant that she had yoghurt and toast ready when she came down.

"Good morning Daisy."

"Morning."

"Eat up. Lessons start in 20 minutes. Is the food alright?"

"Yes. Thank you."

"No problem."

"Hopefully, our first lesson of the day interests you. I believe your mother was Chinese, so chances are, she spoke Mandarin. Would you like to learn or would like to start with something else?"

"I'd like to learn."

"I thought so. We'll start with counting."

After an hour, Daisy could count to 99, and was ready to learn other words.

"We'll learn more tomorrow. Now, it's time for math. I got Koenig to print out an assessment. It'll be boring, but then we get onto funner stuff, okay?"

"Okay."

May was right, the assessment was extremely boring, but Daisy came out with a result of an extremely high natural aptitude even though she was below grade level in terms of knowledge.

"Daisy, what were your teachers like in your last schools?"

"Well, some were good and some were bad, but I never got to know them for long, because often I was out of the school within the month." May hadn't even thought of how the switches would have affected her education, and she was sure that the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents that dropped her off at the orphanage hadn't thought of that either. She wondered if Daisy would one day end up at the S.H.I.E.L.D. Children's Academy that the old S.H.I.E.L.D. used to have. It was meant for the children of agents so that they would get a good education and get to make friends that they didn't need to keep secrets from. It would was also planned in order to avoid children getting jealous of the children that had normal lives that were found in public schools. She could imagine Daisy there easily. She snapped out of it when she remembered Skye.

"Okay. Good to know. Now, what would you like to work on last? You can choose between English, science, and history.

"Is English reading and writing and stuff?"

"Yeah. Do you want to work on that?"

"Yes, please. I'm not very good."

"We'll see. I'm glad you chose to work on the thing you find difficult. Not many people would choose that. I'm sorry to say that means another test. Read out loud what it says on the tablet, please. Then write about what it was about."

_Her reading abilities were below average, but her writing abilities were actually as good as the reading which at her age is very rare. They're well within a good range. My guess would be bad education, but a lot of effort._

The message showed up at the top of the tablet when May opened the results. Koenig worked fast.

"Well done, Daisy. Tomorrow will be more exciting. Time for lunch, and then after you can choose between fighting, and gymnastics for this afternoon."

After they finished lunch, Daisy was curious about the different options.

"For gymnastics, we'll work on jumps, rolls, and landings. Maybe a few other things if we have time. For fighting, we'll probably learn a couple different types of punches and a kick."

"Gymnastics sounds funner. Is that okay?"

"Sure. I'll grab you a leotard."

May came out a minute later with a small, black leotard with the S.H.I.E.L.D. emblem on the left shoulder.

"We're lucky that the person in charge of this place, Agent Koenig, is very prepared."

"Who is he?"

"I'll tell you after you've changed. Do you know how to get to the gymnastics room?"

"Yeah."

"Okay. Meet me there in five minutes. I need to make sure everything's set up."

Four minutes later, Daisy was dressed and ready to go.

"Great. First thing is landings. Get on top of this block."

Daisy climbed onto the block.

"Jump off and land like this with your two hands right in front of you." May demonstrated the right position."

Daisy did it but nearly fell over.

"Good first try. Try again until it feels impossible for you to fall over.

It took a few tries, but around the seventh May deemed that she was ready.

"Next, do you know how to do a somersault?"

"I've seen people do them."

"Could you try on the floor for me?"

It took a few tries, but eventually Daisy succeeded at doing something that resembled a forward roll. May brought out a small, fabric ramp.

"Try from the top of this, and with the extra speed, try standing up without using your hands."

It took a few tries, but Daisy was eager and a quick learner.

"Well done. I'm happy with your progress. Do you want to know why gymnastics is important?" Daisy nodded.

"Some people in this world aren't very nice, I know you've met some of them, but there might come a time when I can't keep you safe. I really hope that doesn't happen, but if it does, someone might push you off of somewhere, and you will need to be able to land and keep fighting. If someone pushes you when you are on the floor, you need to be able to roll and keep fighting. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"Good. That's it for floor today. Next is beam. You need to learn balance."

They spent the next few hours in the room, going over various skills and techniques that would one day be useful if Daisy ever needed them.

"Well done. Go wash off. Dinner will be ready, and then we can talk about tomorrow."

As May walked into the kitchen, it crossed her mind that some six year olds might not wash on their own. She was almost worried, then she remembered that with Daisy's childhood, she'd probably been washing herself since she was two. Soon after she'd put the dinner on their plates, Daisy walked in, hair dripping everywhere.

"What happened to your towel?"

Daisy looked around and realized the mess her hair was making.

"I'm so sorry!" she sprinted back up the stairs. May had easily heard the panic in her voice. She followed her and knocked on Daisy's door. No answer. She opened the door. No sight of her. She closed the door behind her and turned to check under the bed, but she saw her hiding in a corner, frantically drying her hair with a towel.

"Excellent instincts. Well done. If I was just checking the room, I never would have thought you were here. Now, why are you hiding?"

"I wanted to dry my hair before you saw me next, so you might ignore that I forgot."

"Why would I need to ignore that?"

"I know. I'm sorry. You wouldn't. What's my punishment?"

"No. I meant that wet hair isn't a big problem. It's fine. I don't need to ignore it. No punishment."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Remember? Different house, different rules. How about I dry your hair?"

"Okay."

May grabbed the the towel and gently massaged her hair.

"Why don't you come to my room and we can use my hair dryer."

"You're okay with that?"

"Yeah. Why wouldn't I be? I don't think the hair dryer will care." May said with a smirk. Inside, she was desperately hoping that Daisy understood the message. This type of thing was normal and not something to be shocked and overwhelmingly grateful for. May opened the door to her room.

"Here we go. Sit on the bed." She turned the hair dryer on and ran her hand through Daisy's hair, drying section by section. By the end, Daisy looked the most relaxed May had ever seen her. It was easier to see the resemblance to Skye and the pain tore through May's heart. She saved it for when she'd need it. She almost didn't want to stop since Daisy was so relaxed. She kept the dryer and started running a brush through Daisy's hair. Once she'd gotten used to that, she turned the dryer off. She kept brushing long after the knots were gone.

"Come on, Daisy. Time for dinner."

"Right. Okay." You could almost see her walls coming back up, and May resolved to one day bring them down.

After dinner, May sent Daisy to bed before calling Andrew.

"Melinda? What happened? Did you find her?"

"Yeah. I'm sorry I didn't call. She was having a panic attack because of all the guns there. I'm worried she's seen them before. It worked out okay, but I should've called last night. I'm sorry."

"It's alright. I get that you're in a very confusing situation. How is she now?"

"Today was good. No powers were displayed. I'm now seeing hope for her to open up one day."

"I'm sure she will. If you ever think you might need me, you can always bring me there."

"I don't think I'll need to take you up on that, but if I need to, I will. Thank you for offering."

"No problem."

"Good night, Andrew. Thank you for everything."

"You're welcome. Night, Melinda."

Just when she was about to go to her room, her phone rang.

"Coulson?"

"May."

"What's happened?"

"It's Bobbi. She's fine, but she got into a bad fight. We were tracing some HYDRA that we thought would have info on Skye's dad."

"Why are you calling me?"

"She can't stay on board. She can't come on missions with us now, and we go to too many dangerous areas to leave her on the plane alone."

"So…"

"She wants to come to you and Daisy. She's desperate to be useful."

"She knows about the quarantine risks?"

"Yeah. She figures the highest chance for something to happen has already happened. Now we're just being extra cautious."

"I suppose that's mostly true. If she wants to come, she can come. It'll be good for Daisy to have someone here other than me."

"Okay. Thank you. I'll let her know."


	5. Day Four

May walked into Daisy's room at seven the next morning to find that Daisy was already up.

"Hi May. I was just putting clothes on."

"Great. Now, I have some interesting news. Hopefully you'll be okay with it."

"What is it?" Daisy asked, extremely confused, but May was relieved that she didn't look scared.

"Someone else is coming to stay with us."

"Another kid?" May could see a bit of fear creeping onto her face.

"No. Someone in between our ages. She's a friend of mine, and I'm sure you'll like her too. You've seen her before. She was part of the group of people I was with when Coulson brought you up to Skye's room."

"Oh. Okay. When is she coming?"

"In half an hour, so let's go downstairs and eat breakfast before she gets here."

"Okay." May a little disappointed that the expressionlessness had returned, but she supposed it was to be expected.

Bobbi ended up knocking precisely five seconds after they finished breakfast, so May figured she'd already scouted them and the whole area. She opened the door and was horrified. Her left arm was in a cast, and both of her feet had boots, she was also limping, so May figured something had happened to her leg as well.

"Bobbi?! What happened?"

"HYDRA."

"I know, but… we'll talk later." She didn't want Daisy hearing all the horrible things Bobbi must have endured.

"Hi Daisy. My name's Bobbi. It's nice to meet you."

"You too. What happened to you?"

"I got into a fight with some bad people."

"Will you be okay?"

"Yes, I will. Thanks for asking. Have you guys had breakfast?"

"Yeah. Have you?" asked May.

"I've had food. It's hard to have specific meals when you're changing time zone constantly."

"Right. We were just about to start the educational part of the day. We could give you a tour, you could work with us, or you could do rehab."

"I'll stick with you guys, I've had enough of rehab and I can tour later. Maybe one day I'll be helping with the lessons so it'll be good to know where you're at."

"Sounds good. Daisy, could you get your stuff out? I'm going to grab the tablet."

"Okay." She went off to her room.

"Bobbi. We'll need to talk later. How much did Coulson tell you?"

"Not much."

"Okay. Tonight, once she's gone to sleep. For now, we'll start with reading. Koenig has printed some things up and there's a couple apps we'll need on the tablet. No one has ever really taught her to read."

"Why not? She's six, isn't she?"

"Yeah, but she's been switching schools every few weeks for her whole life. It was hard to find foster families that would take her period. Never mind ones that lived near the same school as the others."

"I never thought of that. It's a miracle Skye was as smart as she was."

"I know. I think it's because of a previous boyfriend that I met. I hated him, but now I'm slightly grateful. He was the one that taught her how to hack, and that was the only thing that gave her self-confidence before S.H.I.E.L.D.."

Right then, Daisy came down the stairs.

"I'm ready."

"Great. I have a couple books we are going to read, and Bobbi's going to watch over us to make sure I'm not being a bad teacher. Goodness knows I've never done it before." Daisy smiled a bit at that. They read books and by the end, thanks to a lot of effort and persistence on Daisy's part, there was noticeable improvement. After that, they did some math worksheets that Daisy had no trouble getting through. Finally, they did a bit more mandarin. Bobbi had left midway through to do a few of her exercises.

"Well done, Daisy. You improved a lot today. Time for lunch. Hopefully Bobbi has it ready."

May was right and Bobbi did have it ready. They finished eating quickly.

"You've got good service here, food, nice rooms, schoolwork already prepped…"

"Yeah. I think Koenig just gets bored." replied May.

"When can I meet Mr. Koenig?" asked Daisy.

"In person? Not for a while, but we have to video chat him at the end of the week."

"May? Could I please ask a question?" Daisy said really quietly. Bobbi shot May a look that May ignored.

"Sure."

"How is video talking possible?" This time it was May that shot Bobbi a look. She hadn't thought of the fact that Daisy only had memories of the early '90s. She decided now would be the best time for at least part of the big reveal.

"Daisy, what year is it?"

"1994."

"No, it's not. When you came out of the pile of rocks, time changed for you a bit. It's 2014."

"How is that possible?"

"We're not sure. Weird things happen in this world." replied May.

"Is that why you have the tablet and everything is really fancy?"

"Yeah."

"Oh. Okay. That makes sense. Are we doing gymnastics again this afternoon?" May thought it was one things that made the least sense, ever. She looked over at Bobbi who seemed to share the same impression.

"Yeah. Get your leotard on, and meet us there in five minutes, okay?"

"Yeah." She ran up excitedly to her room. Bobbi turned to May.

"That talk tonight is going to be very long."

"Count on it."

* * *

Gymnastics went well. Daisy could do all the things they'd learned the day before and got learned the new stuff quickly. They'd done similar type thing and added the trampoline. May knew that was every kid's favourite part of gymnastics, and she felt bad that Daisy had suddenly found out she was living twenty years in the future, regardless of how well she seemed to be taking it. Dinner was over quickly, and she and Bobbi made excuses to send Daisy to bed early. They went into the living room. Bobbi looked like she wanted to start talking, but nothing came out.

* * *

"I'm going to go day by day. It's been quite busy. First day, she would barely talk to me. She kept wanting to call me ma'am. As you've seen, she doesn't really chew her food; she inhales it. Since the pyjamas hadn't come through yet, I said she could use one of my shirts as a nightie. She completely panicked at the thought of being a nuisance. I managed to get her to sleep, but that night I woke up and I couldn't hear much, but I could hear enough to make me feel worried. I ran into her room and she was having a nightmare, reliving a memory. By the sounds of it, she'd called her foster mom 'Mommy', and then she was being sent away. I woke her up, and she threw herself under the bed. That's when I looked around the room and noticed everything was shaking, so it seems that's something else the obelisk has done to her." She stopped talking. She wasn't proud of the next part, and didn't really want Bobbi to hear it, but she also knew that Bobbi would definitely notice if she skipped over something.

"Now, this ties in with what happened next. I may seem like I'm going off track with this story, but it's long past time I told you the truth about Bahrain." She told the whole sad story, including shooting the little girl, and Bobbi was silent at the end of it.

"You're the bravest person I've ever met."

"What do you mean? I literally ruined my marriage, went into hiding… Did you know I was supposed to be your S.O.? I'd scouted you, and I was really looking forward to taking you under my wing. I left that too."

"Sure, you separated yourself, but there was no way you could've done anything else, something like that breaks you. I'm honoured that you were going to be my S.O. though, I never knew. Anyway, trying to pretend otherwise accomplishes nothing, but you still stayed within S.H.I.E.L.D.. After something like that, most people would leave absolutely everything, and try and pretend it never happened. You stayed in the same company, in a place where you were known for the worst moment of your life, hailed a hero and called The Cavalry... I didn't even think that was possible."

"You'll think I'm less brave when you hear what happened when Daisy was making everything shake. I left. I left her hiding under the bed, and ran to my room where I called Andrew. He told me to go back, and I did, but that whole time she just curled up under the bed, and someone else was leaving her."

"You need to forgive yourself for that."

"Why? I'm not about to forgive all the people that have left her. I want to kill them. Why should I forgive myself?"

"Because they didn't come back. No matter what happens, with Daisy, if she stays as Daisy or returns to Skye, do you think her life is going to be a paradise? Ignoring the fact that she's a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, she has powers. That automatically puts her in danger. Not to mention, if you spend enough time together, you're going to get into arguments. You will leave her again, but you will always come back. Now she knows that. All those people that left her before, none of them came back except you. Why do you think she's started to open up?"

"Really?"

"Yeah. She starting to hope she can trust you. You have a long way to go, but I bet she hasn't felt like that in a while."

"Thank you, Bobbi."

"You're welcome."

"Anyway, so after that, I called her out from under the bed. When she finally came out, she went straight for a corner. I crawled over to a few feet away from her. Eventually, I got her to come to me. She was still asking not to be sent away, not to be hurt. We were both crying. When Daisy stopped, it was to apologize. I was still crying, so she was apologizing for making me sad, for absolutely everything she'd ever done, including existing. That made me stop crying. I told her never to apologize for anything like that again, and we talked for a bit. She's never even celebrated her birthday because she doesn't have one. I brought her to my bed that night."

"Let me guess, she tried to leave the next morning."

"How did you know?"

"No one has ever told her it's okay to open herself up. I'm sure she completely thought you were going to send her away too."

"Yeah. She'd hid inside a shed on the property, one full of guns. By the time I found her, she was having a panic attack. I don't know if she's seen someone shot or what, but whatever the case she was terrified of them. I carried her to her bed where she slept for an hour, and then she woke up full of apologies. Once I'd convinced her that she hadn't done anything wrong, we had a good afternoon and went skating. Ever since then things have been good, but I still feel like I'm waiting for the next thing to happen. I'm not sure if that's because of what has happened before, or because of my life."

"It's probably a combination of both, but you're also probably right. We'll look after her."

"Thank you. For being here, for everything, just, thank you."

"You're welcome. Wait."

"Daisy." They ran to her room as the whole house shook.


	6. Night Four

"What are the chances that this is a normal earthquake?" May called as they ran up the stairs.

"My probability is a bit off for things that are supposed to be impossible. You know, like five year olds with magical powers." They made it to the door. May opened it slowly.

"I'm sorry! I can't make it stop! What's happening to me?" Bobbi turned to May.

"Did she not realize it was her before?"

"I guess not."

"Daisy. Could you come here please? Everything is going to be okay. I promise."

"May! Please. Make it stop." Daisy walked over.

"Daisy. You need to breathe with me, okay? Close your eyes. Pretend nothing is happening. Breathe in. 1, 2, 3. Breathe out. 1, 2, 3." It took a while, but eventually things started to move less, until eventually everything had stopped. Bobbi crouched down to Daisy's level.

"I understand if this is scary, but could you please tell us what you were thinking and feeling when everything started to move."

"I… I was remembering the last time that people were nice to me. They said I was going to live with them forever, and I thought I would too. One day, someone called and said I had to go back to the orphanage. They said they had found someone from my family. We were really sad. I didn't want to go, even if they were family. I'd seen families. Parents can be mean to their kids, and aunts and uncles and stuff are normally worse. These people liked me, so I didn't want to go. I was crying and they just took me. The people that were supposed to be my family never even showed up." Everything in the room was starting to shake again.

"Breathe, Daisy." May reminded gently.

"I was worried that was going to happen again here. This is the first time since then that I feel like maybe someone actually wants me."

"We do, sweetheart. We do." Bobbi opened up her arms, and Daisy crawled over into them. May looked at them, at Daisy wanting to have a home, but still not believing that it is possible. Time for the next part in the story.

"I have something else to tell you. Part of it is who Bobbi and I are. We're spies, a little bit like in the movies. If someone is going to do something bad, we stop them before they can."

"That's so cool!"

"Yeah. We have some crazy jobs sometimes. Some people who worked where we work actually met you when you were a baby."

"Really?"

"Yeah. There was some bad people trying to get you, and they were sent to protect you. The bad part is so that the bad people couldn't find you, you couldn't stay in one place for a long time. That's why you've been in so many different homes."

"You mean, it's not because they all hated me?"

"Not at all. You were moved to help you."

"Thank you." Daisy moved out of Bobbi's lap, and into May's to give her a hug.

"Does that mean I'm going to have to leave here too?"

"No. Bobbi and I are really good at fighting, so if bad guys come, we'll be able to protect you. It's also why you're learning gymnastics. Remember when we talked about how you could use the things you learn in a fight?"

"Yeah."

"This is all part of what we need to do if you're going to stay with us."

"Okay. Thank you for keeping me."

"Do you believe that you'll stay now?" Bobbi asked.

"Yeah. I do. Does that mean you know anything about me? Like my name, or my parents' names, or what they looked like, or my birthday."

"We know the name you were born with. We don't know anything else yet, but we're trying to find out. You were born with the name Daisy." May replied.

"Really?"

"Yeah. That's why Coulson suggested it when he found you. That's where he is right now, actually. He's looking for more information about you."

"Why? Why would he do that for me?"

"Coulson cares about you, and he also hopes that knowing more about where you came from might help you to control your powers." May nearly gasped. "Actually, I need to talk to him. Could you stay with Bobbi for a bit? I think I might be able to get you a picture of you as a baby with your dad."

She went to the hub where she called Coulson.

"May. It's late for you."

"Yeah. I know. Bobbi should be putting Daisy to bed, but I just remembered that wasn't there a picture of Skye and her dad when we went to where he was living."

"Yeah, why?"

"Maybe it can be used for facial recognition, even if you can't find him, you can at least figure out who he is. Also, could you send it to me, Daisy wants to know what her parents look like."

"Yeah. Sure. I'll send the photo along now, and I'll call you back in 10."

"Thanks." Her phone buzzed with a picture, she sent it to their picture printer, and found a frame in the drawer. She went up into Daisy's room where she found her sitting next to Bobbi.

"Hi. I talked to Coulson. I don't have any more information on you, but I have a picture of you with your dad when you were a baby."

"Could I see it?"

"Of course. Here."

"He looks nice, and he looks like he cares about me."

"Yeah, he does, doesn't he?"

"Will I ever get to see him?"

"I don't know. Maybe one day. Coulson's calling soon though, so I got to go. Bobbi will stay with you, and I'll come back to say goodnight and I'll tell you if he tells me anything important." She went back to the hub, and Coulson called a few minutes later.

"You were right. Facial recognition identified one Calvin L. Johnson. He was a doctor in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He went to the Hunan Province of China with Doctors Without Borders. He married a woman named Jiaying, and had a daughter. One Daisy Jiaying Johnson, born on July 2, 1988. That becomes July 2, 2008. We did an internet search on the face for other photos. We're sending them your way. There are some wedding photos Daisy might like. We can't find any other photos of Jiaying. It seems she likes to stay off the grid. In terms of the search, he still owns his doctor's office. We're planning to break-in, make it look like your average robbery. We'll track everyone who comes in and out of the room to see if they have any contact with him. We're throwing everything into this."

"Thank you. I appreciate this, and so will Bobbi and Daisy. Good night, Phil."

"Night." May picked up the photos from where they'd been sent directly to the printer. She grabbed an empty album, put that in her room for later, and took the photos up to Daisy and Bobbi.

"Daisy? I have news and information."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I have more photos, and I have your full name."

"Can I see them? What is it?"

"Here they are. Your full name is Daisy Jiaying Johnson. There are some pictures there of your mom, too. Her name is Jiaying, and your dad's name is Calvin."

Daisy sat there for a minute, mouthing the words and flipping through photographs.

"Were you able to find out my birthday?" She looked up hopefully.

"Yes. You were born on July 2, 1988. Since you're twenty years in the future, that means that it's also July 2, 2008. Whatever the case, you're six years old."

"Thank you!" Daisy leaped across the bed to where May was sitting to give her a hug. Bobbi looked on, smiling.

"You're welcome, honey. You're welcome." Daisy looked through the pictures for another ten minutes, before May insisted that she go to sleep.

"I'm sorry, but you will either sleep in or be exhausted tomorrow and neither of those are good options. You'll have time to look through them tomorrow." She took the photos from Daisy and tucked her in.

"Good night." said May.

"Good night." said Bobbi.

"Good night." said Daisy.

May said good night to Bobbi, and spent the next hour placing all the photographs in the album. What amazed her most was how normal they both looked, and from what Coulson had found, they led normal lives as well. Losing Daisy must have destroyed them, or at least Calvin. They still had no idea what had happened to Jiaying. She was worried about what would happen if Daisy and her father ever met. He couldn't be trusted with her, but she didn't know if Daisy would trust her enough to believe her and turn away from all her dreams. She hoped so.


	7. Months Later

Three months later, May, Bobbi, and Daisy were close. May and Bobbi were training to their fullest, Daisy watching in excitement. May still had the edge, but they were incredibly close which made watching very exciting. Daisy was actually starting to learn to fight in her own right. She had made lots of progress in gymnastics, and had set all sorts of extremely difficult goals for herself. She had thrown herself into life at the Playground, and was truly happy. May and Bobbi worried about how she would do once she left. Especially since that time was coming today. While Daisy loved talking to the people on the Bus, she hadn't really spoken to any of them in person. Her favourite person to talk to was Coulson, but she found Hunter funny as well. She was even bringing May out of her shell a bit. Bobbi worried that she might lose that a bit when they went on the bus, but she believed that May was strong enough not to. Time would tell.

"Daisy! Hurry up! Bobbi's already outside waiting for us."

"Coming!"

They had all their stuff packed up in duffel bags and suitcases. As they were walking out the door, Daisy stopped.

"What's wrong?"

"It's just… this was the first home I've ever had."

"You'll always have it. If you stayed here, but a bunch of strangers came to live with you, then would it be home?"

"No."

"So that means it's Bobbi and me that are your home, and the people on the Bus will become your home, too."

"I'm still scared."

"That's okay. Be brave." May kept walking and heard Daisy following her.

When they got onto the Bus, Bobbi was being greeted with excitement and hugs. Daisy hid behind May's legs.

"It's alright. You've met them on the TV." Daisy nodded, but still looked uncertain. Right then, Coulson came over and gave May a hug.

"It's good to see you, both of you."

"You too."

"Hi Coulson." Daisy walked over tentatively and gave him a hug.

"Hi Daisy."

"Do you want to come with May and me and take your stuff up to your room? You can come back down whenever."

"Okay. Thank you."

May and Coulson picked up the bags, and Daisy held onto one of the bags May was holding. Once the bags were dropped off, Coulson went to say hi to Bobbi.

"Why don't we unpack before going down?" Daisy looked up in relief at May's words.

After quickly unpacking, they went back to the main area. Daisy was holding May's hand. She wanted so desperately for them all to like her, and she was worried that it was going to be a lot harder in person than it was on the TV. Bobbi was the first one to notice her.

"Daisy. Why don't you come over and say hi to Hunter?"

"Hi Hunter."

"Hi Daisy. Bobbi was telling me that you did a really good job looking after her."

"That's not true! Bobbi doesn't need anyone looking after her. She's strong."

"Oh yeah, you're right." He leaned in conspiratorially. "She's scary too." Daisy giggled. Bobbi shot him a look.

"Not to interrupt the party, but we have an issue. Bobbi, could you reroute us to Faro, Portugal. I'm so glad to be off auto-pilot. Anyway, apparently, Lady Sif is in town."

"Do we know why?" asked May.

"No. I guess we'll see when we get there."

It was decided that Coulson and Bobbi would go in, with everyone else on standby.

"Thank you for watching her." said Coulson to the hotel greeter as they walked in.

"I hear from the Prime Minister's office I'm to hold this crazy lady here for you, I hold this crazy lady." he replied.

"How did you subdue her and get her to wait?" asked Coulson.

"No subduing. She stayed willingly once I told her I'd found this 'Kava' and he was on his way to meet her."

"Oh. But I'm not Kava."

"I'm glad I'm not the one who has to tell her that. Pick up her sword from booking before you go."

Coulson and May exchanged a glance before Coulson walked up to where Lady Sif was waiting.

"Lady Sif. It's me, the son of Coul. Do you remember me?"

"No. I don't remember anything or anyone, but you're not Kava, then."

"No. But I'm a friend. We've worked together before." He showed her an image of the last time she was working with S.H.I.E.L.D..

"I apologize. I still do not remember."

"You have no memory of who you are?"

"I-I know I am from Asgard. But I do not remember my home there. You tell me my name is Lady Sif, but… why I left Asgard, what brought me here to Midgard… why I wear these hides instead of armour… a mystery."

"One I'll help you solve. I'm sure a clue will turn up somewhere." Right then, May came back from talking to Simmons.

"Twitter. Simmons found it." She walked over and showed a video of Sif fighting a man by the water. Unfortunately, Lady Sif still didn't remember anything, but it was decided that if she had traveled all this way for him that it was important enough for S.H.I.E.L.D. to get involved, especially since she somehow lost her memory. Little did they know that he was wiping away someone else's memory at that second. They decided to send a team down to the area where the fight had happened, but unfortunately, other than a pole that had been broken by liquid nitrogen, there wasn't much. When they eventually caught him, they were all horrified to discover his true purpose.

"I'm here to hunt down a monster. Someone who might appear the same, who might act the same, but has an uncontrollable power. Something happened to them recently and it needs to be sorted out." May discretely left to make sure Daisy was in her room, and not coming anywhere near.

"What do you mean sorted out?" Coulson asked.

"They need to be killed."

Lady Sif, now with her memories back, thought that was a bit extreme.

"That's unnecessary, but I'll bring him or her with me to Asgard. We can put the proper protections in place there."

"None of this needs to happen." interrupted Bobbi. "This planet has many powered people for various different reasons. There's no need to take action until they do something wrong. If things get out of control, then we can contact you. Trying to find a powered person among the other 7 billion people on this planet is impossible."

"There's no way…" Bobbi jabbed him with his memory stick, and pictured him forgetting everything since a few weeks before landing on Earth.

"Where am I?" he asked.

"Excellent question. What are you doing here?"

"I'll take you to a room where we can formulate a plan." offered Coulson. Bobbi had created the whole entire mess. She was welcome to deal with it. Lady Sif turned to her.

"You've proven your worth as an organization before, but everything I know tells me that I shouldn't let you do this. "

"Give us a chance. I don't want to see someone uprooted from their whole life and sent to a different world for having powers like so many other people here on Earth. You'll know if it becomes a serious problem.

"Daisy? Are you in here?" May walked into the room where Daisy was to live to find her flipping through the photo album again. She smiled.

"Hey. I thought I'd come in and check on you. I'm sorry today has been boring for you. We'll get to lessons and training tomorrow, but we have time for a little meditation now if you want."

"Okay. What's happening downstairs?"

"There's an alien who's here looking for someone, but I think he's going to end up going back home soon."

"An alien?!"

"Yeah. We see a lot of weird stuff here."

"Do all spies meet aliens?"

"No. Just the ones in our business."

"That's so cool! I want to be a spy like you one day."

"If you want to, you will be, but first you need to learn how to control your power, and meditation helps."

"Okay."

Once Lady Sif left to check in on Coulson and the Kree, Lance and Mack both looked at Bobbi, expecting answers for her extreme defence of their ability to support the powered person. She played it off as if it wasn't something unusual, and hoped they'd buy it, but she figured Hunter wouldn't. She would need to check with May and Coulson that it would be a secret worth sharing. She knew how lucky she was that Fitz and Simmons had been in the lab for the whole episode, especially with Simmons's new stance against powered people. She knew that the plane was going to scare Daisy and she hoped their training would pay off. She'd have to talk to May. She waited until Hunter, Mack, and Coulson had gone off to send off Lady Sif and the Kree before going to Daisy's room where she figured May still was. Sure enough, Daisy was going over some mandarin with May's help. Bobbi walked in.

"Wǒmen xiànzài xūyào tán tán." We need to talk, now. May turned to Daisy.

"I've got to go with Bobbi for a bit. You can keep practicing, and it would be great if you could finish the next page in your math book, okay?"

"Sure." Daisy seemed to know something serious was happening.

May and Bobbi went into the hall.

"Is this about Daisy? I know we need to talk to Coulson, and figure out what to tell the others, but we already talked about that."

"I know. It's worse than we thought, though. I don't think we can tell them, not yet. The only person who I think wouldn't freak out is Hunter. Mack is anti-powers because of his alien experience, and Fitz-Simmons is terrified of the change in Raina's DNA, which we both know Daisy probably has as well. It would be bad enough if it was Skye, but this is a six year old with a traumatic childhood. Logic dictates that they're right, but I can't do that to her. Locking her up or sending her to Asgard would make it a million times worse."

"I agree. I didn't realize how bad it was. We definitely need to talk to Coulson later, and if you want to, we can bring Hunter in on it. Is that it?" Bobbi wanted so desperately to say yes.

"No. I want to tell you this now, before it gets out, and because at this point you might be the person I trust the most out of everyone. Also, I think you trust me, and I'm hoping telling you now is the only way I can salvage that trust."

"Bobbi. What is it?"

Bobbi told the whole story of the Iliad, and being sent in to go undercover with Coulson's S.H.I.E.L.D., and how Hunter knew something was up, even over the video call, but she couldn't bring herself to tell him. How Mack was part of it too, and soon they were planning on bringing everyone in to this other S.H.I.E.L.D.. Bobbi looked at May hopelessly.

"When I said I trust you, you are maybe the only person I trust fully. Coulson has his faults, but he's not a bad person. Mack is now too scared of anything alien to trust him, and the other S.H.I.E.L.D. is convinced Coulson is keeping an enormous secret. I'm worried that when this comes out, I'll lose everyone. You, Daisy, Mack, Coulson, Hunter… There are no good options here, and I don't know what to do."

"Well, sometimes that's the price of doing the right thing. No one understands, and it hurts like Hell, but first, you need to tell Hunter. He has enough trust issues already, and keeping this from him might ruin you for good. Then, you are coming with me to Coulson and telling him everything. Do you believe our two groups could be allies?"

"I really hope so. Otherwise, I lose everything and everyone."

"You won't lose me. You told me and I understand your story. In your place, I would've done the same thing. Who will be the easiest to convince on both sides?"

"Hunter doesn't know enough, and he'll probably be mad for a while. Mack is too devoted to the other side. I think Agent Weaver will be our best bet on the other side, and then Simmons on ours. Also, that has the added bonus of distracting her from Daisy."

"Good plan. You need to let go of the connection to your personal life. There will be arguments and fights, but that can't distract you from your mission. You must join the two groups. I think Coulson will be a bit mad at first, but he'll come around. Discovering that a large faction of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents has set up their own base and life, and send spies to his base is not something you want to hear. Now, let's grab Daisy and eat something while you wait for Hunter to get back. Okay?"

Bobbi hugged May, and to her surprise, May hugged back. "Thank you for understanding."

"Thank you for doing the same with me. Now, I'll go find food. Could you remind Daisy of how important it is not to mention her power? Also, mention that we need to start actually training. It would be nice if we had Cal, but I don't think we'll get that luxury anytime soon."

"Agreed." Bobbi walked into Daisy's room.

"How's the math going?"

"I have two more questions."

"Great. Finish those up, and then it's time for lunch. Also, I know we said that we were going to tell everyone about your powers once we got here, but I think we're going to have to wait a bit longer. Everyone is really stressed about lots of different things, and when we tell them we want them to be calm so we can help you the most, okay?"

"Okay." Daisy looked a little sad.

"Hey. You still have me, May, and Coulson. If you want, I can tell Hunter too."

"Please. I don't like keeping secrets, and the more people that know the less it feels like a secret."

"Okay. I'll tell him."


	8. Months Later Pt 2

May, Bobbi, and Daisy had just finished lunch when Mack, Hunter, and Coulson had walked in.

"How did it go?" asked Bobbi.

"Success. Lady Sif is on her way back to Asgard, and the Kree is on his way to Halla."

"Great. Hunter, could I talk to you for a minute?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Let's go to the conference room."

When they got there, Hunter looked at Bobbi in concern.

"Bob? What's wrong?"

"Only everything. I've been keeping secrets from you, Hunter, and it's time I finally told you everything."

"I knew it." Hunter said half sad, half triumphant.

"Yeah, and I couldn't to that to you again."

"What is it?"

"First, is the easier one. You haven't even guessed yet. It's… well… Daisy has powers. We think the same thing that happened to Raina probably happened to her she just hasn't changed her outward appearance in the same way."

"So you're saying instead of becoming a bloody porcupine, she became a little girl."

"Pretty much, but she can also make things shake. When she is over-emotional, everything around her shakes. She basically causes earthquakes."

"That's intense. Do you think she's the one the Kree was here for?"

"Yeah. Well, her and Raina."

"That's awful. Who knows?"

"Myself, May, and Coulson…and now you."

"No one else? Why not Fitz-Simmons? They could probably reverse it."

"I doubt it. It's why we've delayed on getting Skye back. For one, I doubt it's possible, and second, it will definitely show that Daisy has powers."

"Would that be such a bad thing?"

"Yeah. I don't trust them, at least, not while Simmons is still on her anti-alien rampage and they're both so horrified by the change in Raina's DNA. Not to mention, Mack can't be the only not knowing, and there's no way I'm telling him after his hatred of anything alien after what happened to him."

"Why are you telling me? It's not like I need to know."

"No, but I trust that you won't hate Daisy and that you won't tell the others. I've learned many times over that keeping things from you generally accomplishes nothing. Which is why I'm telling you my other secret as well. Mack and I are here undercover."

"What do you mean? God, Bobbi, you're not HYDRA are you?" Bobbi was slightly relieved to see that at least he reached for his ICER and not his gun.

"No! How could you even think that?!"

"I don't know. Maybe the fact that you said this secret is huge, and that you're here undercover?"

"Sorry. I shouldn't have snapped, but I'm definitely not HYDRA."

"Glad to hear it, but if you're not HYDRA then who are you?"

"I'm here as a mission from a different S.H.I.E.L.D.." Once again, she told the whole story of the creation of the other S.H.I.E.L.D..

"Whoa… Does Mack know you're telling me?"

"No, but he thought I should a while ago. He wants to make you a part of the other S.H.I.E.L.D. too."

"Do you want that?"

"No. I think your loyalty is more to this team than to the organization, and I get that. It wouldn't be right for you to switch."

"Then why are you telling me?"

"Because soon the truth is going to come out, and I'm going to be universally hated. I didn't want to be hated by you too."

"Why will the truth have to come out?"

"Because our mission is to get information, and then get the toolbox and the team to our S.H.I.E.L.D., but I'm changing that plan. It might end up with me being targeted by both sides, but I'm telling Coulson everything, today."

"I'm going with you."

"No, you aren't. You're not part of this mess, and I'm not dragging you into it. I already have May going with me to play mediator if the need arises."

"You told her?!"

"Yeah, and she's on my side."

"Whoa. Who knew she would choose you over Coulson?"

"I don't think she would think of it as that. She thinks Coulson will be less than happy, but she doesn't think he'll do anything drastic. I trust her."

"Okay then, but what will Mack do?"

"He'll freak. Big time. I just don't know if I want him to freak before or after I tell Coulson."

"Tell him after. If you tell him before, he'll make it into a big thing that make him look really bad. Even if the groups end up joining, no one will trust him. You don't want to do that to him, no matter how good it will make you look."

"You're right. I'll just hope that May and hopefully Coulson can convince the others not to hate me."

"I could never truly hate you."

"I know." They locked the door and didn't come out for quite a while.

Bobbi walked up to May's room and knocked.

"Coming." A second later the door opened.

"You ready?"

"As ready as I'll ever be."

"How did Hunter take it? Never mind, I think the fact that you've missed a button answers that question."

Bobbi tried to hold in he blush. "He's on my side, but he also shares all my worries so that's great." she said sarcastically.

"Well, your worries are legitimate, you just have to hope they don't end up coming to light."

"I hate relying on hope."

"We all do, and yet, here we are." May knocked on the door to Coulson's office.

"It's Bobbi and me."

"Come in." They walked in the room.

"Is something wrong? I haven't assigned anything to either of you."

"I have something to confess."

"That sounds ominous." Coulson replied, half joking, half serious.

Bobbi was really getting tired of telling the story, but for the third time that day she told the whole entire story.

"Why?! Why was it so hard for them to trust me? I would've been happy for us to work together. Do you know how long I spent looking for Gonzales? I was desperate to find him, and he must've known that."

"He might not have. He cut off from absolutely everyone, and that's why I came to you, because despite Mack, and everyone else at the other S.H.I.E.L.D., I believe we can work together."

"What's your plan?" asked Coulson tiredly.

"I want Simmons to talk to Agent Weaver. They both hold a lot of respect for each other yet are fiercely loyal to each group. I'm sure they can at least arrange a meeting."

"Very well. Will you talk to them both?"

"I will."

"I guess that's that, then. Is there anything else?"

"Well, there's Daisy, sir. The Kree was here for both her and Raina, and we saw how worried Sif was. She needs to learn how to control her powers, which we means to find Cal yesterday. Is there anyway we can leave a message in his office, and hope that somehow it gets to him?"

"That's risky." He turned to May. "Do you truly think it's necessary?"

"Yes. It's only so long before Daisy has another nightmare, and everything on the plane starts shaking."

"I'll leave a message. If we get him to agree, who will meet him? The three of us?"

"No offence, Coulson, but he doesn't like you. At all. I think it would be best if May and I went. You can listen through on comms, or spend some time with Daisy. She was really looking forward to getting to know you in person."

"I want to get to know her too, but a part of me is worried that the reason Skye and I connected was because I introduced her to a home. Now, she has that, and I play no part in it."

"Coulson." May sighed exasperatedly. "Daisy is literally Skye, just younger. You loved Skye, which means you care for Daisy already. She will see that. You know how perceptive Skye always was. We all have our roles to play in her life. You just need to find yours. All the more reason to have Hunter listening in on our conversation, and to have you look after Daisy. It will be the first time she's without either of us. If something happens, you should be the one with her. Hunter can have you on hand, and we'll make sure the conversation is recorded. Bobbi told him about everything by the way. He's on your side for the business with the other S.H.I.E.L.D., and he'll support Daisy."

"Very well. Thank you. I'll get someone to leave a message this afternoon, and I'll let you know if we get a response." Bobbi and May thanked him and left the room.

"That went well, didn't it?" Bobbi confirmed with May.

"It did. It will take him a while to process, and he won't want to think about it, which in a way is good since it means that he will put all his effort into finding Daisy's dad. Your worry should be about Mack and the rest of them finding out either secret. Hunter knows to keep it to himself, right?"

"Yeah, but I should go tell him how the meeting went. I wish we could keep Daisy updated."

"Me too. I'll go upstairs now, and see if there's anything I can tell her. You go talk to Hunter."

"Daisy? How are you? I'm sorry if you've been bored lately, but I have more things to tell you."

"Has something happened?"

"A bit. Coulson's been looking for your father, and we think we're getting closer to finding him."

"Really?! That's great!"

"I'm afraid it's not quite great. Have you ever had foster parents that were nice sometimes, but could be mean at others?"

"Yeah. It was sad."

"I'm afraid your father might have the same problem. We're sure he won't do anything to you, but he might put you in danger without trying to, or he could get mad and hurt one of us."

"I don't want that! You can stop trying to find him. It's okay." Daisy seemed a bit sad, but resolved.

"We're not going to stop. We think he might have information about how to help you with your powers."

"It's not worth it! Not if he's going to hurt one of you."

"Thank you, but it is. Don't worry, we can beat him."

"I don't want you to get hurt."

"We'll be okay. How about when Bobbi is done talking to Hunter, we hang out, just the three of us, like it was at the Playground?"

"Don't you have stuff to do?"

"There's always stuff to do, but we can fit in time for us."

"Thank you."


	9. Meeting Cal

May, Bobbi, and Daisy spent the afternoon in the same way they would've back at the Playground. They both trained Daisy for a bit and then Daisy got to watch as they sparred. Hunter came in for a moment and saw them fighting.

He stopped and said, "That's bloody terrifying." and then he left. If Daisy didn't know better she would've said that May and Bobbi didn't even notice him come in. Daisy found it really funny that Hunter was so scared of them. She hoped when she was older, she'd be just like them. They then grabbed dinner, and though Daisy felt it was to distract her from the fact that her dad could be a bad person, she still had a great time. She'd worried that when they moved to the plane she'd lose them. While Bobbi was tucking her in, Coulson came in.

"Bobbi. We've gotten a meeting with Cal. Have you talked to Simmons yet?"

"That's good. I haven't talked to Simmons yet, but I'll talk to her tomorrow. When's the meeting?"

"Tomorrow afternoon or evening. I'll discuss the plan with May tonight and she can debrief you tomorrow."

"Okay. Good night, sir."

"Good night, Agent Morse. I'll send in May to say good night before we talk, so you can say good night to her too." he said the last part to Daisy.

"Thank you, Coulson." Both of them replied.

After having said good night to Daisy, May came into Coulson's office to discuss the plan.

"What did he say?"

"A message was left where we left ours. All it said was 'Veteran's Park', which is a park that is fairly nearby."

"No time?"

"No. I'm sure he'll be scouting the area all day."

"We should get there around one or two. It gives him time to scout without keeping him waiting too long. It's the best for him which shows we're making an effort."

"That's what I thought. How much are you going to tell him?"

"Depends on how he's acting."

"Bobbi's good at reading people so I'll let her start off with the talking. We cannot afford to trigger him with anything."

"No, we can't. Are you sure you don't want me to come?"

"Really, Phil?" May raised her eyebrows. "You know you're one of the only triggers we actually know."

"I know. I just want to be useful."

"You will be. You're the only person that can stay with Daisy, and she is essential to everything."

"Fine. Could you ask Bobbi to arrange for the call with Simmons for while you're gone? I don't want any of them spending time with Daisy until we've learned to control her power. Simmons is so worried about what happened to them that she even said if Raina died it would be a good thing."

"That's not good."

"No. It's really not. Mack will be the same, and while I don't think Fitz would, I don't want to create another fight between him and Simmons."

"That's fair. I'm sure Bobbi will do it."

"Do you trust her after what she's told us about this other S.H.I.E.L.D.?"

"I think I trust her all the more for telling us. In her position, I probably would have done the same thing. The fact that she couldn't bear to betray us says good things about her as a person. Plus, she's opened up to me, and I'd say I even consider her a friend."

"That's not like you. I always figured I was your only friend on the team. You cared about Fitz-Simmons, but you were never friends with them. Being Skye's S.O. never gave you that opportunity either."

"Yeah. I think it's a good thing. Especially since if we can't get Skye back, which seems to be likely, one day Bobbi will be Daisy's S.O.."

"Have you talked about this with her?"

"No, but it makes sense. Bobbi is basically doing the job now."

"Aren't you?"

"Yeah. We both are, but if Daisy sticks with me then I won't be in a position to be her S.O.."

"Do you think she'll stay with you?"

"I don't know. There's a lot to figure out, and a lot that relies on the meeting tomorrow."

"You're right. Go get some sleep. I'll see you in the morning. Good night."

"Night."

The next morning, May woke Bobbi up as soon as she'd finished her tai chi.

"We're meeting Daisy's father at one o'clock. He doesn't know when we're coming. He's just assuming that we are. Here's his file. I want you to do the talking until we have an idea of where he stands in regards to well… everything."

"I prefer analyzing people during interrogations, and then, I'm generally trying to get information, not trust."

"Well… start planning your approach then, and talk to Simmons soon. The Quinjet is leaving in two hours."

"Copy that. I'll put on my gear and then I'll find Simmons."

"Simmons. Could I talk to you for a second?" She was eating breakfast.

"Yeah, sure. What can I do for you?"

"To make a long story short, I have some ex-S.H.I.E.L.D. contacts that are trustworthy but not allied with us. Coulson is aware of this, and I told him I'd ask you to be responsible for starting our journey to an alliance."

"Why me? Who are these people?"

"The representative you'll be talking to is Agent Weaver, which is why I chose you."

"Wait… from the Academy?"

"Yeah."

"When am I talking to her?"

"In four hours, and don't tell anyone. We're trying to keep this as quiet as possible until the alliance is made."

"Very well. I'm sure I'll have more questions for you later."

"You can ask whatever you want, after the phone call. May and I have our own mission this afternoon, so come find me tomorrow. And Simmons, try your absolute hardest. You have no idea how important this is."

"Understood, Agent Morse."

It was a relief to be back on the Quinjet. Being on the Zephyr felt like a ticking time bomb until Mack found out what she'd done.

"So… based on his file, he was a really good guy with no emotional issues. Was it just losing Daisy that made him crazy?"

"No. When Coulson met him, he said he was stronger than he should be. It's a guess, but there's a possibility that he tried to make a super-strength s/erum."

"Why does no one ever realize that that is a VERY bad idea?"

"I'm not sure. I guess after Captain America, everyone adopted the 'if it was done once, it can be done again' attitude."

"If it's one that has to be taken periodically, maybe his emotions will even out if we just take him in and stop him from taking it for a while."

"It's a good plan, as long as you can convince him to come with us."

"I will."

They left the Quinjet cloaked in abandoned field nearby, and walked to the park. They sat on a nearby bench.

"Now, we wait, and hope he shows up." said May.

"He'll probably keep us waiting for a while, if he's monitoring us. He'll want to see if we're serious."

"I'll wait here all damn night if I have to."

"Hopefully, he won't take that long."

It was around 45 minutes before he finally showed up.

"Mr. Johnson. Thank you for coming."

"It's Zabo."

"We're approaching you as Daisy's father, not as the man you've been in recent times."

"Is Daisy alright?!"

"Yes, she is. However, her powers are out of control."

"Why isn't she here herself?"

"It wouldn't be safe for her, and she knows that. We're not keeping her prisoner."

"Is she on that horrible list you call the Index?"

"No. She isn't."

"Mr. Johnson, please. We need someone to teach her how to control her power. I don't know if you can, or if you know someone, but we're worried about what will happen if she doesn't learn."

"I've tried! The people that can help her the most, won't, and I don't know why."

"Is there anyone else that can? Please. At least, is there any advice you could give her? You have our word that if you come with us, nothing will happen to you as long as you don't hurt any of us."

"Why should I trust you?"

"Because you want to see Daisy, and you know that we do care about her and won't let anything happen to her. Also, that at the very least, we perceive ourselves to be the good guys. We are the type of people that believe in promises."

"I'll come, but know if you break any part of our deal, I will do everything in my power to tear you all apart."

"We know." replied Bobbi.

"I have a question. The serum that gives you superior strength… does it need to be taken often?"

"How do you know about that?"

"Logical reasoning. Could you please answer the question?"

"It does."

"Well, I'm afraid we're going to need you at your psychological best. No irrational anger, no emotional triggers… If you want to do what's best for your daughter, you will stop taking the serum. She needs your heart and mind more than she needs your strength."

"It's already out of my system. I brought a weapon if I needed to fight, and I wanted to have a clear mind for our conversation."

"Excellent. We have something to tell you then. Daisy was de-aged to the age of six."

The emotions flashing across his face were too quick for May to catch, but Bobbi caught most of them. Happiness, sadness, hope, horror, excitement, fear… There were more, but she was still surprised when he screamed "No!".


	10. Cal Has a Plan

May finally spoke up. "Mr. Johnson! Why is this so bad? What does it mean?"

"It means all my hopes and dreams are gone."

"How? I hoped you wouldn't be excited, but I figured with the serum in your system for sure, you'd want to take her and raise her as the family you should've always had. I took an enormous risk telling you even without the serum running though your blood." Bobbi asked.

"It's her mother. She can never find out."

"We thought she was dead." observed May.

"She was. HYDRA cut her up and removed all her organs, but like Daisy she has powers. Hers are of healing and longevity, but they require her to drain others in order for them to work at their fullest. Before HYDRA, she hated it. The Elders would sacrifice their lives to her so she could bestow her wisdom on many generations, but she would beg them not to. She had a good heart. I believe she still does, but not towards humans. She doesn't enjoy killing them, but if it helps her or Inhumans she no longer cares at all. HYDRA made her hate all of them. The only people she is loyal too, are a group of people named Inhumans. They're changed humans with powers. They like to stay off the radar, and they're no harm, but they're terrified that they'll be discovered by the outside world. It's Jiaying's worst fear. The reason Daisy is six years old is that she must have endured a life-changing event at that time. Something that would've affected her for her whole life. I don't know what it was, and I doubt we'll ever find out now, but no six year old should ever have that happen to them. If Jiaying finds out, it'll mean war. Currently, her hate of humans is rational. She doesn't go out of her way to kill them. It would be completely irrational if she finds out that Daisy had to undergo something like that at her age. The only reason I'm not doing the same is because unlike her, I am human. My plan was to take Daisy to her where she'd be trained, but I can't. Even if I didn't care about the human lives, I think at this point even six year old Daisy would be loyal enough to you to fight her. Not all foster kids are blindly loyal to their parents, if they've seen parents being mean to their children they lose faith in everyone unless you can show them otherwise. Even if they try and find their parents, it can be out of revenge, and even those that still have hope are expecting it to be taken away. If Jiaying does what I know she'll do, and Daisy gets in her way, I worry that she might turn on her own daughter. I don't know my wife anymore."

"How do you know that much about foster children?"

"I was one. Why do you think I was so mad to find out how Daisy grew up?"

"We can change that for her now. Is there any way to bring back the adult her?" asked May.

"None. Terrigenesis is irreversible."

"What's Terrigenesis?" replied May.

"The process Daisy went though to get her powers, to make her an Inhuman."

"Should we be worried about these other Inhumans?" asked May, finally fully joining the conversation.

"No. They're good people in complete control of their powers, and they've been living amongst us for centuries."

"Okay. What's our plan to help Daisy if we can't trust Jiaying?" asked Bobbi.

"There's one person who might be able to help. She was the best transitioner at Afterlife, and one of the most trusted, but she got into an argument with Jiaying about her methods. I'm not sure about the specifics. She'd always been in the Air Force, a high-ranking officer, but she was brought in to help people that really needed it. I think a few people left when she did. Jiaying never went after her. I'm not sure if it was because she mourned their relationship, or if they made an official truce. Probably both. Jiaying has never done bad things yet, but I know she could. I think the separation was based more on the fact that Jiaying had complete control, and wouldn't let anyone else have any. She made everyone feel valued, but I never knew how genuine it was."

"We can discuss Jiaying later. Who is this person and what's her power?" asked May.

"That's the problem. There's no question we need her. We also need her information on if a doctor left Afterlife with her, because we need someone to help Daisy's genetics undergo the change. It takes forever without scientific help, and that makes the power harder to control. The problem is that I have absolutely no idea how to make her trust us. She does not trust us, and I don't think we're capable of bringing her in."

"That's going to be a problem, but you're a doctor, can't you do the genetics stuff?" asked Bobbi.

"No. That knowledge is restricted to Inhumans."

"Okay. You've dumped a lot of knowledge onto us. I'm assuming Afterlife is what you call the place where Inhumans are taught to control their power and can live in the regular world?" asked May.

"Yeah."

"Okay. There's no Inhuman doctor that you know of that isn't loyal to Jiaying?" asked May.

"None."

"Okay. What's the power of this Inhuman that left?"

"She's a good fighter, but that's not her power. She can detect other Inhumans. It's useless now, because she has no way to activate Terrigenesis, but it was extremely useful back when she was at Afterlife. In addition to being one of their best transitioners, she was by far their best recruiter."

"We need to find her. What's her name?" asked May.

"Maria Hill."

"Finally. Good news for once." May said, almost smiling.

"What do you mean? Do you know her?"

"Yeah. She's one of the people, on my list of less than 10, that I trust."

"Does that mean that you can contact her?"

"Yeah. We'll pick her up now."

"May. Why are you calling?"

"Where are you? We need to pick you up."

"What's happening? Are you in danger?"

"No. We only have a six year old Inhuman who has had no medical treatment and has no control of her powers."

"I'm at Stark Headquarters. I'll meet you on the landing pad."

Maria Hill walked onto the Quinjet and drew her gun, pointing it at Cal.

"Cal. What are you doing here?"

"It's fine. He's weaponless, and the serum should be out of his system." said May.

"Nice to see you again too, Maria." Cal said.

"Still haven't answered my question." replied Hill.

"They have Daisy." Cal said.

"You found her?!" Hill said in shock. May looked at Hill in shock because she'd never seen that expression on Hill's face. "How? After all these years… Never mind. I'll talk to you later. Who is the Inhuman? And how do you have her? Jiaying would never put a six year old through terrigenesis, and even if she did, it would be at Afterlife."

"Daisy's the Inhuman."

"But she'd be twenty-si… Oh, Cal. I'm so sorry. Do you know what happened? How did she go through Terrigenesis anyway?"

"Not yet, but I'll find out. For Terrigenesis, the old-fashioned way… Kree temple and everything."

"Whoa. That hasn't happened in hundreds of years. Anyway, you know enough to get her to Afterlife, don't you?"

"Probably. It would take a lot of effort, but I don't want to anyway. I don't trust Jiaying to not declare war, if she found out that Daisy was de-aged to six."

"I don't think she would go that far."

"She would. You never found out everything, Maria. It was worse than anyone ever knew."

"Why didn't you tell anyone?"

"They would've chosen Jiaying over me. Also, she does good enough by them, and she doesn't encounter humans often enough to do damage."

"Fair point, but since when do you care about human lives?"

"Since I think Daisy would choose S.H.I.E.L.D. over Afterlife, and I think that Jiaying would choose Afterlife over her daughter. I wouldn't be able to guarantee Daisy's safety if the war happened."

"Glad to see you haven't changed." Maria said with an eye roll. "How did Daisy end up in S.H.I.E.L.D. custody anyway? And why would she choose S.H.I.E.L.D. over her family?"

"Daisy is Skye." May said. Hill's eyebrows shot up.

"Well, that changes things. I can't believe that I never met her after Coulson saved her. I literally played a part in her rescue from Ward! I'm sorry for that, Cal. I don't know what I would've done, but if I'd met Skye, I would've known she was Inhuman. And what with the no last name, right age range, and probably some resemblance, I would've known."

"It's fine. I have her now."

"Yeah. What do you need me for?" she turned to May and Bobbi.

"We need to find a doctor who can get her through the physical process. We were hoping you would know someone who would know the process that isn't loyal to Jiaying."

"I don't know anyone, but between Cal and Fitz-Simmons, I'm sure they can manage the process once they have the notes on how to do it. I have them on me. I brought everything I have on Inhumans."

"Excellent. Thank you. By the way, Agent Morse, ex-Commander Hill." said May, introducing them.

"It's nice to finally meet you." said Hill.

"Likewise." replied Bobbi.

"Is there anything else you need from me?" asked Hill.

"She needs a guide." Cal said.

"No. I have a job. Being a guide takes time, and besides I'm a transitioner, not a guide. Never mind the fact that I've never been anything for a six year old."

"Stark would let you do whatever you wanted as long as you told him it was S.H.I.E.L.D. business. Helping a six year old who's adult self was a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent would definitely qualify."

"Fine. I'll do my best. What's her power?"

"Unknown. She makes things shake."

"Oh. We can't train her on the Bus, then."

"Okay. We'll get everything sorted medically, and then we'll go to wherever Daisy needs to go to be trained."

"Could I look at the notes now?" Cal asked trying to make his excitement look not obvious, and failing miserably.

"If anyone found out I was doing this, I would be hunted for the rest of my life."

"I know." Cal replied. Hill passed him the sheets. Cal flipped through them, gasping.

Each time, Hill cringed.

"So… Inhuman?" May asked Hill.

"Yeah. It's one of the reasons I joined S.H.I.E.L.D.. I figured if I couldn't help out Inhumans, I could at least help powered people. It was as close as I could get."

"Huh. So, mind giving me the run down. Afterlife, transitioner, guide… Cal throws out random terms as if we should know them."

"The original Inhumans were genetically altered by the Kree. Their children were born human, but would change if they encountered Terrigen crystals. The process is called Terrigenesis. Afterlife is a halfway house. When Inhumans get turned, they get a transitioner and a guide. The transitioner is there to help them adjust to any physical changes, and is there to help them adjust to the real world when they leave. They don't actually train, but they do everything else. They're basically a mentor, and they help find positions for them in the real world after Afterlife if they don't want to go back to their old everyday lives. The actual training comes down to the guide. I'll be the guide and Daisy won't need a transitioner since her life will be so weird anyway. She won't even need to hide her power, just control it. I've never been a guide before, but I've seen it done plenty of times."

"So your gift… you see a person and you can tell if they're Inhuman?"

"Yeah. It's this sort of glow. It's hard to explain. Don't worry, you're fully human."

"Glad to hear it. You might as well get fully updated on everything else. Gonzales, Weaver, and a few others are leading another faction of S.H.I.E.L.D.. Agent Morse was sent with Agent Mackenzie to get information on our S.H.I.E.L.D.. She's come to the realization that working against each other is dumb, and those of us that she's told agree. Right now, that's her ex-husband Lance Hunter who's joined our S.H.I.E.L.D., Coulson, myself, and Agent Simmons. Simmons should be talking to Weaver right now. Agent Morse thinks they're the best chance for an alliance.

In regards to Daisy, everyone is completely anti-alien at the moment so no one knows except Agent Morse, myself, Coulson, and Agent Hunter. We've already had a Kree come looking to kill whoever was turned. Lady Sif from Asgard came to find out what a Kree was doing on Earth and even she wanted to bring whoever it was back to Asgard and monitor them there. Everyone is terrified of Inhumans. Why?"

"The Kree lost control of their experiment so they tried to eliminate it. When they couldn't, they got scared. When nothing happened, they assumed we'd died off or something had happened to the crystals. What actually happened is we're not evil people who want to try and take over the planet. No one knows we exist, and we're fine with that."

"Okay. Hopefully, that explanation will calm Fitz-Simmons and Mack down enough to not do anything rash. Fitz-Simmons will probably be too interested about the change in DNA to think about anything else."

"Scientists." Hill rolled her eyes.


	11. The Arrival

As they got off the Quinjet, May was unsurprised to see Daisy and Coulson waiting for them.

"Hi Daisy." said Bobbi, opening her arms up for a hug that Daisy happily gave.

"Hello Coulson." said Hill with a small grin.

"Hill. Why are you here?"

"I can help Daisy, but we'll talk later. Why don't you take Bobbi and May to discuss the mission?"

"Sure." The three of them walked away.

"Hi Daisy. My name's Maria. I'm going to help you learn to control your powers, but first, I'm going to introduce you to your dad." Cal had been told everything about her life so far, and how she had no idea that she grew up to be Skye.

"Hi Daisy. I'm your dad, but you can call me Cal since you don't know me. I've been looking for you for a very long time."

"You wanted me?" Daisy said in shock.

"You have no idea. We looked everywhere for you. I'm sorry we never found you."

"It's okay. You found me now." Daisy hugged him, and he hugged back, overjoyed. Hill looked away so no one could see that her eyes were watering slightly.

"Daisy, while May, Morse, and Coulson are talking, do you want to show Cal and me what you've learned so far?" Daisy showed them the tricks she'd learned in gymnastics, how she'd learned how to punch and kick, and the things she was doing in school, like speaking mandarin. She also told them stories of funny things that had happened like Hunter being scared of May and Bobbi, and fun things like skating on her second night at the Playground. Cal was so glad he wasn't on the serum because like this, he could be happy for his daughter who was clearly happy for the first time in her life. If he was on the serum, he would probably go hunting after them right now for stealing the moments who should've had with his daughter. It was clear she was proud of herself, and he was so proud of her.

"I'm so proud of you. That's amazing. I'm sure your mandarin is a lot better than mine." he said smiling. "I'm glad you're learning."

Hill on the other hand was analyzing what she had to work with. There was no question the kid was cute, and she seemed to be a quick learner. She wondered what had happened to her originally. She was fairly sure six was the youngest anyone had ever been de-aged. Right then, Coulson, Bobbi, May, and Simmons came into the room.

"Mr. Zabo, could you please go with Agent Simmons and discuss your plan with Agent Fitz?" asked Coulson.

"Sure, and it's Mr. Johnson." Cal said, looking at Bobbi. She smiled. They left to go the lab.

"Daisy, Hunter's going to be training you this afternoon. Could you go find him?" asked Bobbi.

"Okay." Daisy said and went off to find him.

"So Simmons spoke with Agent Weaver. They're no happier than we are, and Bobbi's going to be in a lot of trouble, but there's hope. She's going to discuss it with her board. Mack doesn't know yet." said Coulson.

"That's as good as you were hoping, right?" asked Hill.

"Yeah, but it means that we're going to need Bobbi and May. Bobbi is the one who came up with the idea of the alliance, and May is one of the only reasons they're considering agreeing to it. They want her on their side."

"I feel like this is more important than I was given the impression of." observed Hill.

"Probably." replied Coulson. "However, that means that neither of them can go with you when you train Daisy."

"I'd rather not have Daisy's dad with them, no matter how much he's reformed." said May.

"Agreed. Does he know what happened to Raina?" asked Coulson.

"Yeah. He says she was taken to Afterlife." said May.

"That's not good. Raina knew that Skye turned into a child. If she tells Jiaying…"

"It would be a disaster." finished Hill. "Send Cal in. Hopefully he'll be able to tell us what they're planning. It also means that you don't need to send him with Daisy and me."

"That's a good idea. How long will you need Daisy?"

"At her age? At least a couple weeks, probably more. I'll call in with updates, and we'll stay near Stark. She'll be safe, and she'll get to meet a real, live superhero." Hill said to May and Bobbi's worried looks while rolling her eyes.

"It's just… today was the first day she's been without us." said Bobbi.

"How did she do?" asked Hill to Coulson.

"She was good. She missed you guys at one point, but I just told her a bunch of stories about us." Coulson said, turning to May.

"See? I'm fine. I know all of your whole life stories. Not to mention, I know Jiaying and Cal's from when they were good. I know enough to keep her entertained for months."

"How do you know mine?" asked Bobbi.

"In addition to May, I was also interested in you when you were in training, and even Romanoff was curious."

"Wow. Thanks for telling me all this, May." May didn't answer and rolled her eyes. Hill smirked. Simmons, Fitz, and Cal walked in.

"We've got a plan, but we need supplies." said Simmons.

"Do you know where you can get them?" asked Coulson.

"Yeah. We just need the Quinjet and a pilot." said Fitz.

"You've got both. Take May. I need to talk to Hill. Bobbi, I'll talk to you later. For now, check in on Hunter and Daisy." said Coulson. They went into his office.

"What do you need, Coulson?" asked Hill.

"Advice."

"You're the director."

"Apparently that doesn't mean anything. Some of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s best agents have created their own organization because they don't trust me to be director." He collapsed into his chair. "What do I do?"

"Coulson! If I was still your superior, I would demote you this second. That attitude is completely useless and doesn't help you whatsoever. Normally, you're the one that is nauseatingly optimistic."

"I'm optimistic because I trust in this organization, and I trust in my team. Both have turned against me."

"That is the most blatant lie I've ever heard you say. This is your organization, and it is running smoothly, and you are doing your job well. A member of your team literally turned against their original team because they believe in you. That is why Fury chose you to be director. It is rare that people can forge such strong connections with others. Now, snap out of it because your pity party isn't helping, and none of us have the time for this, especially me."

"Fine." He said, rolling his eyes. "What do you need me to do? Thanks for allowing me to wallow, by the way."

"I'm not your superior, and I don't give you orders. You're the director, Coulson. Directors don't get to wallow, and they don't look for orders. What would you have thought if you'd seen Fury acting like you just did?"

"It would've completely changed my perspective of him. I looked up to him too much."

"Exactly. You're lucky I've always considered us equal. You're not losing your reputation in my eyes, but you need to pull yourself together if you want to direct both S.H.I.E.L.D.s."

"Okay. Thank you… Unless I'm not allowed to say that." Hill smirked and rolled her eyes, and Coulson grinned. "So… there's a whole race of not-really-human powered people that you somehow forgot to mention?"

"Yeah. It must have slipped my mind." replied Hill.

"So, if you're one of them, what's your power?" asked Coulson.

"It's pretty useless now, but I can identify potential Inhumans."

"How come you didn't tell us Skye was one?"

"I never met her. If I did, I would've known she was Cal and Jiaying's daughter. I always kept an eye out, just in case."

"Were you close with them?"

"We were. Jiaying saved me, and raised me at Afterlife. She was nearly my mother, and later on, my sister. When HYDRA took Jiaying, she changed. I was young, so I don't remember much, but she had lost concern for human life. When I was older, I realized I didn't like what my future looked like at Afterlife, so I left. I kept an eye out for both of them, but she stayed the same, and Cal continued his quest."

"I'm sorry you lost them. Skye spent her whole life looking for connections, and you were literally right there."

"She was looking to fill a very large void. A lot of that would've been a genuine desire to discover more about her past, but part of it would've been that until Terrigenesis, every Inhuman feels that there's something missing within them. Skye would've assumed the void was her parents. While it was a hard journey for her, I've heard of many worse ways of filling the void."

"I'm glad then, that the void is finally filled. How hard will it be to control her power?"

"I'm not sure. I don't think a child this young has ever needed to be trained before. A life-changing event at age six? I do not want to think of what that could've been. Terrigenesis senses if there was anything as big as the change you go through that has happened to you before, and replaces that. For something as big as having a change in your DNA, and being able to cause earthquakes and avalanches to happen at age six? It's unheard of, and Jiaying never put young kids through terrigenesis. The last kid who transitioned at a young age was Katya Belyakov."

"Wait, Bahrain? That was an Inhuman?"

"Yeah. From what I heard, Jiaying told Eva that she didn't think Katya should go through terrigenesis, ever. She had a bad feeling. Eva didn't agree so she stole a crystal and left. I don't know why she transitioned Katya that early, maybe it was an accident, maybe she was worried they would get caught, I don't know. Whatever the case, you know how well that worked out."

"Does May know?"

"Not yet. I'll tell her before I go. Jiaying was mad about it, but from what I heard there was nothing else May could've done. Jiaying was just looking for reasons to hate humans. That was one of the things that confirmed I made the right choice. Sometimes, over the years, I felt like I'd exaggerated how bad it was, and I felt like I should've stayed. This confirmed that I'd made the right choice." There was a knock at the door.

"It's Bobbi."

"Come in."

"It's the Board. Weaver talked to them, and they've agreed to talk to you, me, and May. I know she's out, but they said they can have a conversation with her later. They want to talk to us now. I didn't mention Commander Hill was here, in case she didn't want to talk, but I'm sure you'd be a big help."

"Fine. I'll take joy in knocking some sense into their heads."

They walked into the room, where the Board was already waiting on the screen.

"Agent Mor-Commander Hill. We weren't expecting you."

"No. You probably weren't. It was rather sudden. Would you like to explain to me why you're on the Iliad and not at the **S.H.I.E.L.D.** base? I'm under the impression this was not an officially sanctioned mission." There was no response. "Very well. It's not like I actually expected any of you to give a decent explanation. I've heard enough from everyone here anyway. However, in the interest of an alliance, I will answer any questions you might want to hear my opinion on."

"Very well. Is there any way you can give us confirmation on the fact that Coulson is safe from any further alien threats? We've received reports that was carving impulsively without control, and was by all accounts, insane." Luckily, Hill had heard the stories.

"I can most definitely confirm that. Some memories were being forced upon him, an uncompleted quest. The quest has been completed, and with luck, it aligned with stopping HYDRA. As a result of that, the unfortunate alien moments have disappeared."

"How do we know something else won't come up?"

"The procedure was performed on many subjects, and the only result was the drawing of a map. Now the map has been completed, we can confirm that there will be no other episodes."

"Very well. That is excellent news. However, there is still the matter of the lies you have been telling everyone about your trips. All the S.H.I.E.L.D. money… What is Theta Protocol?"

"You idiots." said Hill. "If I was still part of S.H.I.E.L.D., I would never agree to this alliance after the idiocy you've all showed. You are aware that directors keep secrets? Fury kept far more important ones."

"Does that mean you know what it means?" asked Weaver.

"Of course. The mission is mine and Coulson's."

"Hill. Let's tell them. I trust them with this. It'll prove that they can trust us, too." said Coulson.

"Fine. Theta Protocol is an operation to rebuild Helicarrier 64. It was decided that it was a wise thing to do, in case of emergency. So there. The big bad secret is revealed." said Hill sarcastically.

"Well, then, Coulson. It seems we should've trusted you. I ap-"

Hunter knocked on the door. "Not to interrupt, but they're back, and they want to get started… now."

"Thank you, Agent Hunter. I'll go, and I'll send May in here. If you want my input, I side with Coulson on everything." said Hill.

"Please bring Mack in here too." called out Gonzales. Hill nodded, then strode out of the room, Hunter rushing to keep up.

"He's taking inventory." called out Coulson.

May and Mack walked in soon after.

"What the hell?" Mack looked at the scene in shock.


End file.
